Grieving Woman Finds Comfort in Battling Drunken Driving

Flora Price lost her daughter, Malina Price-Bos, in 1996 to a drunken driver who crashed into the vehicle. Stephen Tyner was sentenced to 15 years in prison and was released in 2008.

By ELVIA MALAGON THE LEDGER

AUBURNDALE | Flora Price flipped through thick scrapbooks, looking at photos and mementos of her daughter who was killed 16 years ago by a drunken driver.For Price, December is the busiest times of the year. She sat amid mailing bins, filled with red ribbons carrying the Mothers Against Drunk Driving message. Nearby, next to the family's Christmas tree in their Auburndale living room, large portraits of her daughter are surrounded by angels.As Price talked, a woman who was charged with driving under the influence, quietly folded the ribbons that are sent as a reminder to not drink and drive."You can't help but wonder what she would have become," Price said.

BEAUTY QUEENMalina Price-Bos was born in Haines City in 1972 and grew up in Auburndale. She graduated from Florida Southern College in Lakeland and she and her husband, Ronald K. Bos, moved to Israel to become missionary teachers.She was known for her work in local and state-wide beauty pageants. At 19, she was crowned Miss Auburndale, and in 1993 she won the Miss America organization's Community Service Award. Her pageant portrait with a beaming smile hangs near the Christmas tree. Flipping through photos of her daughter, Price tells about her daughter taking a risk that cost her a title. Malina Price-Bos broke away from the skit she was supposed to perform and instead acted as if she was a fetus asking not to be aborted."You can't stop someone's who's driven like that," Price said.Price said she encouraged her daughter to find a job nearby after she graduated from college, but her daughter said she didn't want to work for pay and left, with her husband, for missionary work.But the marriage was short-lived. Ronald Bos died of carbon monoxide poisoning in the apartment where the couple lived in Israel. Price said doctors were amazed Malina Price-Bos didn't die from the poisoning.She returned to Auburndale but that too would be short-lived. She immersed herself in volunteering at a girl's shelter in Orlando and in her spiritual life.On March 17, 1996, two months after her husband died, she and her parents were heading home from church on Recker Highway in separate vehicles when a vehicle crossed the center line and sideswiped the vehicle Price and her husband were in and then struck the vehicle Malina Price-Bos was driving.She died at a local hospital from her injuries. She was 23.According to police reports, Stephen C. Tyner had a blood-alcohol level of 0.24 and told officials at the scene that he had been drinking at a few bars.In 1999, Tyner was sentenced to 17 years in prison for driving under the influence manslaughter. According to the Florida Department of Corrections website, he served 11 years and was released in 2008. The death broke Price.She was hospitalized twice and treated for depression. She didn't want to eat and didn't drive for months."I'll say it was a slow crawl out of the hole," she said.

FINDING A REASON TO GO ONA member from the local chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Drivers first gave Price the ribbons to send out. Originally, she sent the ribbons to 2,000 to 3,000 people along with updates about the case. Family members and friends kept asking for the ribbons after the trial.Price said that for a while she kept asking herself why her daughter died, although doctors told her to stop asking for her own sanity.She doesn't have an answer but said her daughter would want her to do something about reducing crashes caused by drunk driving."She left me this cause," she said.Through the ribbons, she also changed her view on alcoholics. A few years into sending out ribbons, a woman, who she would later find out was an alcoholic, volunteered to help Price.It was the first time that Price interacted with an alcoholic and it helped change her perception on people who drink. The woman told Price she had been arrested numerous times for driving under the influence and could have been the one who killed her daughter in the crash. The woman later died.Since then, Price has served as the chapter president of Polk County MADD. She often tells her story, participating in panel discussions at schools and at court-appointed activities.She also drives people to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and lets them volunteer with her if they are on probation.This year, she's excited about the envelopes her friend made for the ribbon campaign. An image of Malina Price-Bos with her crown is on the back of the envelope.She tries to send the hundreds of ribbons out before Christmas."It's Malina's Christmas present," she said, tearing up.

[ Elvia Malagon can be reached at elvia.malagon@theledger.com or 863-802-7550. Her Twitter is @ledger911. ]